Watch former Presidents George W. Bush and Barack Obama remember John McCain

Former President Obama speaks at John McCain's funeral

Former Presidents George W. Bush and Barack Obama joined other Washington notables and the McCain family in honoring the late Sen. John McCain at his funeral on Saturday at the National Cathedral.

Both men drew implicit contrasts between McCain and President Trump, who was reportedly not invited to the funeral. McCain "detested the abuse of power and could not abide bigots and swaggering despots," Bush said. "He respected the dignity inherent in every life, a dignity that does not stop at borders and cannot be erased by dictators."

Obama likewise decried the tone of Trump-era politics. "So much of our politics can seem small and mean and petty," he said. "Trafficking in bombast and insult, phony controversies and manufactured outrage. It's a politics that pretends to be brave and tough, but is instead born of fear. John called on us to be bigger than that, to be better than that."

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He also got in a joke at his own expense. "What better way to get the last laugh than make George and I say nice things about him before a national audience?" Obama said, referencing McCain's primary loss to Bush in the 2000 election and general election loss to himself in 2008.

Watch the full service below. Bush's eulogy begins around two hours and 38 minutes in, and Obama is the following speaker. Bonnie Kristian

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Bonnie Kristian

Bonnie Kristian was a deputy editor and acting editor-in-chief of TheWeek.com. She is a columnist at Christianity Today and author of Untrustworthy: The Knowledge Crisis Breaking Our Brains, Polluting Our Politics, and Corrupting Christian Community (forthcoming 2022) and A Flexible Faith: Rethinking What It Means to Follow Jesus Today (2018). Her writing has also appeared at Time Magazine, CNN, USA Today, Newsweek, the Los Angeles Times, and The American Conservative, among other outlets.